Walter Mosley Little Scarlett, Einaudi Freestyle Noir, 2008
6 vote (political) / 10
Walter Mosley, Little Scarlet , Einaudi 2008
Booooring, say an American. Rather than boring, Mosley's book is actually really obvious, despite the obvious claim to reflect on major issues and at the same outlining memorable characters. 'One of the most complex of contemporary noir, the only true heir of the legendary private detective of Chandler and Hammet' triumphalist reads the back cover; agree that you must sell the book, however, say two is a nonsense in two lines bit ' too. It must be admitted that Mosley is a good storyteller, with a smooth and linear style, and although the pace is a bit 'patchy and fragmented, the result can be understood but not enthusiastic. A narrative, however slight, which reduces the contents of a list of cliches . Easy Rawlins is a detective by profession, as so often in the genre, but a veteran of World War II in color, which is to investigate a murder during the uprising in Los Angeles in August 1965.
is explicitly on the side of African Americans, in a continuous 'our poor people against the white slave masters and a corrupt and indifferent towards us', not because they refused, in its purity of thought, to help a deserving white, from which it will, as all who know him, infinite gratitude for his lucid pity. Beyond the buried image of the hero without blemish and without fear, that even more out of place in urban America of the sixties, one could be this simple one-way thinking as an attempt to contextualize the character in the historical situation, as say, a black man in Watts in 1965 could only think so. Can be justified and consistent effort, but certainly neither complex nor too decent, with the aggravating fact that the book was written in 2004, by the time we could now compare well with other descendants of Hammett and Chandler. Another attempt to cut the figure of Rawlins, if not original, at least unusual, is to give it an unconventional family: two adopted children and a faithless wife. Crumley had done with piercing sweetness, while Mosley is caught by the pathos and patina of decency that permeates the whole book: the children are of course two unfortunate that he has saved from a doomed future, and it goes without saying, I love it, while the wife, ran the first time with none other than a prince, has always ensured that it never had intercourse with her lover. In short, even when it loses not lose out much, and what looks like the engine to a well-deserved escapade is resolved with the hero who sacrifices a chaste love the scent of youth not to fall short of its responsibilities. In short, Rawlins is a real winner, and without even much effort. In a besieged city where street violence reigns he can investigate without problems, without having to devise intricate ploys to gain access to situations that are normally forbidden to ordinary citizens since, almost sensing his immaculate mission of justice, the powerful deputy chief of police gives him a pass that allows him to move anywhere without having to give an explanation of sorts to the various authorities. The reality is hard-boiled heroes made, and therein lies much of their charm, the outcasts of society: drug dealers, prostitutes, bartenders seedy, petty criminals and fraudsters. Even in his knowledge of the delinquent hero Mosley is particularly lucky: one is simply the most dangerous criminal in LA (sic), while the other, small crook, is an undisputed genius, and of course both have the hero their valuable gratitude.
when it needs to heal Rawlins turns to a mysterious magician, the repository of ancestral tribal remedies far more effective than any white man's medicine, which stupidly does not recognize the validity and power of fascinating traditions of African Americans, come from think about the good old days when the detective is stuffed with amphetamines and codeine to drive twelve hundred miles without being overwhelmed by fatigue and pain.
Even the dreams of Rawlins are clear and explicit (the metaphor really ridiculous dream of him every reason to continue trying to clean a reality destined to get dirty).
short Mosley's hero is a womanizer, invincible, generous, fair, determined, with clear ideas, lucky, and modest;
'My luck was unbelievable. I only had to stay at your desk, and everything I wanted - sex, love, information ...- I reached by phone or knocking on the door '.
resulting really passed out or just boring place, especially for the alleged overt and absolutely failed, to give the book a memorable tone, just because it attempts to fit into a genre that owes its greatness to overcome, too many years before, just those cliché draws strength from which the main character of Little Scarlet .
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